Conventional sharpening jigs used to sharpen cutting blades, such as a hand plane iron, a skew iron, a chisel, a scraper iron, a skew chisel, or similar type device, typically rely on some type of clamping device to secure the cutting blade to the jig and wheels which move the cutting blade along an abrasive surface, e.g., a grit surface of a sharpening stone, abrasive sandpaper, a diamond plate, and the like. Some conventional sharpening jigs rely on a user to set the desired angle of the iron with a ruler to indirectly determine the approximate angle by extension in a calibration scale. Then, the user strokes the sharpening jig and blade in a fore-and-aft direction on the abrasive surface. However, such a design may result in wear to the wheels, cause grit from the abrasive surface to damage the bearings of the wheels, and any skids from the wheels may cause grooves or ruts on the abrasive surface which may require dressing work to re-true the flatness of abrasive surface. Such conventional sharpening jigs also limit the available abrasive surface area that could be utilized by the sharpening jig because the jig is located on the abrasive surface. Additionally, a very strong hand grip is required to hold the loaded jig and apply controlled stroke forces at increasingly higher angles, often referred to as “white knuckle” gripping.
Other conventional sharpening jigs may utilize an integrated clamping structure that similarly includes wheels or some type of pivot mechanism which allows the user to set the sharpening angle of the blade secured in a clamp. However, such a design has a limited accuracy due to the small protracted design. These devices also suffer from “white knuckle” gripping.
Another conventional sharpening jig includes a pivot design with a small limited incremental scale for setting stone abrasive surface height above the bench and rear wheels which do not contact the abrasive surface. However, this jig yields only a singular, e.g., 30°, sharpening angle of the cutting blade.
Moreover, conventional sharpening jigs typically limit the sharpening stroke to the wheel direction and therefore only a singular orientation of edge to stroke, namely, with the sharpening edge perpendicular to stroke.